Happy birthday, Cassie!

Today is my best friend's birthday. And since it's a milestone-ish one (not saying which), I wanted to give her something extra-special this year. I actually got this idea over the summer-- we were driving up to an Arcade Fire concert, and she mentioned a craft community she'd been following on another blog site that was entirely dedicated to Doctor Who-related crafts. So I was joking that I'd have to make her a sonic screwdriver crochet hook or something....

...and then I did. Along with 3 others.

So this is what I've spent the last week and a half or so doing, on and off. (Though I've been planning this for at least a month.) Four crochet hooks, each representing a favorite mutual fandom of ours. They're all made out of polymer clay and metal crochet hooks.

#1: The carvings are the One Ring inscription from Lord of the Rings. (The first half, anyway.)

#2: A lightsaber! For Star Wars, of course. (I think this one may actually be my favorite.)

 #3: The sonic screwdriver that started it all. (For those of you who don't watch Doctor Who, a sonic screwdriver is a handy-dandy device that can lock/unlock doors, fix stuff on his time machine, basically like an alien Swiss Army knife, but with much cooler sound effects. For those of you who do, this was modeled after the one from the David Tennant years.)

#4: Last but not least, a Harry Potter-esque wand, since she is largely responsible for me liking that series. (Especially given my initial "this is too much like a dumbed down Lord of the Rings" resistance.) This one was modeled after Hermione's wand in the movies, mainly so I could do the vines and such.

I can post these now, because I gave them to her on Friday. And she was laughing so hard that she was practically hyperventilating, so I think that means my gift was a success!

Super Crafting Bowl!!

Wow, I think this may be the first time I've come to this page and didn't have to re-log in because Blogger never remembers me, no matter what I tell it. :P



Anyway, I spent the majority of my afternoon crafting, and completed another project and a half for the swap (it would have been two, but I have to reglue something.) And I had an idea to make a polyclay bracelet, but I realized that the bracelet, more likely than not, would not work. I still made stuff with the clay. I've just had to rethink what I was going to do with it, and I hope it turns out. But sendouts are on Saturday, so hopefully I can get these things worked out quickly.



I've also decided I'm going to redo this shirt:
This is one I designed a couple years ago, and I still love the concept. However, I don't love the fit so much-- the empire waist really doesn't fit me right at all, and I'm tired of it quasi-falling off my shoulders. Not to mention that, despite the fabric being rather thick and, in theory, warm, I realized this morning that the very open neckline makes me very cold. So I think this might be my first major redo for the Wardrobe Refashion, since I checked my stash and I easily have enough fabric to make some modifications, especially since I can reuse the sleeves for sure, and most likely the bottom portion of the front and at least part of the back. I think I'd like to change a few other things, like instead of it lacing to fit in the back like it does now I'd like to make that more of a decorative element on a more fitted shirt, because right now I get this weird bulge of fabric above the lacing, so I may need to add a zipper. And I'd definitely like less skin showing, especially in the back, because my shoulders got so cold this morning. I have a pattern which I think I could probably adapt for the top portion of the bodice (I just need to dig into my summer clothes for the top I made with it so I can check the fit), but if not, it'll be an interesting experiment in pattern drafting.

Ornaments and a bag

As part of my quest to get excited about Christmas this year, I made some ornaments-- four of them last Monday night and three of them yesterday:

They're polymer clay. The designs came from a book of Celtic cross designs that one of my friends gave me awhile back, either for a birthday or Christmas (I can't remember.) I am giving a few of them away to friends as small gifts(mostly the duplicate color ones, though I'm giving the red one away too), but I'm going to keep three of them, I think.
Also, to give credit where it's due, the technique I used came from here. Though since I was working on a surface covered with wax paper, I found that carefully lifting and peeling worked to get the clay up very nicely without having to contaminate a spatula.

This is my other recent project, which is for the aforementioned friend (she doesn't have a link to this blog yet, so I feel pretty safe in posting it.) She's obsessed with swing dancing, and this fabric has reminded me of her for several months now. It's just a basic tote bag, lined with the same fabric as is on the base and with a magnetic clasp. I'm hoping she likes it.

I finally am getting started on my photography swap stuff. Went to Joanns' today to get the last of the supplies, including new supplies for one project because the original plan isn't going to work.